Yvgenie (v1.1)

by C. J. Cherryh

  A shadow fell across the page. Ilyana looked up at Yvgenie’s dark shape between her and the fire, and he said quietly, kneeling and taking her hand:

  “Ilyana, put the book away. Please. You’re coming no closer to the truth.”

  “You’re eavesdropping!”

  A lowering of lashes—a glance up at her: Yvgenie’s eyes, pale and deep and gentle. Kavi’s unmistakable gesture. And the motion of Yvgenie’s hands to lips and heart and to her. I love you. To brow and to heart, frowning. I’m worried. It was the old way of talking. Maybe it was the one he found easiest now. And he was as silent as only her uncle could be, not a whisper of his being there the moment she accused him.

  “Sasha’s very good,” he said ever so softly. “And very strong. He scares himself. And that’s good. A little fear will save you so much pain.”

  Sweat glistened on Yvgenie’s face. A bead broke and ran. “Kavi—is that truly your name?”

  A nod.

  “Is it so hard to speak?”

  A second nod. A gesture toward his heart, with a hand visibly trembling. “He can’t last much longer. He has to rest. Just a little farther, Ilyana, and then we can all rest…”

  One did not like this idea of resting when a ghost said it. But looking into his eyes this close made her think how it felt to touch him and to be touched, and one wished—

  —one wished, that was the trouble, when a wizard loved a ghost: one wanted, and one could have, and if it were not for Yvgenie’s gentle, distressed look to warn her she would not even be thinking no, this is wrong, this is dangerous. He looked so dreadfully upset—

  “Please don’t,” Yvgenie asked her, “please don’t.” And after that, taking her hand in his, on the open book that nobody was ever to touch but her, “He loves you. He loves you very much, Ilyana, and he’s very scared, and something’s dreadfully w-wrong tonight. We’re going somewhere dangerous—and he’s trying to t-tell you—I don’t think he’s ever loved anything in his life but Owl, and he loves you so much he doesn’t want you to go on with this. He wants you just to go home to your father and not to try to help him anymore. Please. He can’t—can’t—go any farther with this—”

  “With what?”

  Yvgenie had no idea. And Kavi when she tried to wish him to speak to her was uncatchable, scattered in pieces, like Owl on the river shore. There were tears in Yvgenie’s eyes, which he was not accustomed to shed in anyone’s witness, he wished he could make her understand that—but he knew what Kavi was doing now, and he knew that for all the advice Kavi tried to give he was helpless to leave her, he could not stop following her or loving her or killing her the way he was doing—he loved her, he loved her whether it was Kavi’s idea or his own, he had come to think more of her in these few days than he had ever loved his own confused existence—

  He touched the back of her hand, where it rested on the book, and she felt that tingling she could never forget and never quite remember. He began to say something—

  Then hurled himself to his feet and away from her, as far as the old tree that sheltered them both. He leaned against its trunk, holding to it like a living person, wanting—

  —it’s life, because he refused to die, he could not want in die.

  Not life, uncle had told her, and she had not heard him. Not life—but hell.

  She folded her book and got up to go to him—wanting him—god, wanting to hold him and help both of them wanting just that touch again—

  The first leaves drifted free of dying branches, and need had become its own wish—little it could matter. She reached out to touch him.

  But he shoved away and turned his back on her. Yvgenie wanted her not to touch him, not to make him touch her, please, no—and he stopped cold, if only because there was nothing in the world Yvgenie could do to stop her. Not fair, not fair to wish someone who could not even hear her doing it, not fair to insist on her own way with someone who could do no more to stop her or Kavi than he was doing now.

  The mouse could never do that—never hurt her father never hurt this boy…

  But mother thinks otherwise. And expecting something is a wish, isn’t it? The mouse can’t hurt anybody. The mouse—can’t. That’s why I like her better.

  Ilyana’s not that good. Ilyana’s her mother’s daughter. But what’s the mouse to be, uncle, grown-up and lonely for the rest of her life because she can’t want anybody?

  That’s crazy, her father had used to shout at her mother. Because we both want something, you have to want not?

  “ Yvgenie,” she said, in the mouse’s voice, very soft, very quiet, and held her hand a little away from touching him, making herself not want him the way she wanted Kavi. “Yvgenie, I’m sorry. It’s safe. Please look at me if you want to.”

  One had to be careful with ordinary folk. And when he did look at her, one could never know whether it was wizardry or not or whether she was only deceiving herself.

  She said, with as much honesty as she could find, “People have to love me if I want them to, even wizards, especially wizards, uncle says, because we hear magic—but ordinary people, too, if we want them to. They can’t help it.”

  “A spell?” he asked her.

  “I don’t know what you call it. I don’t. I just didn’t want in be alone all my life and I wanted Kavi back—I never wanted anything bad to happen to anyone, I never did, I don’t know what’s gone wrong, or why it was, except it’s wrong to want people to love you—”

  He touched her cheek and looked her in the eyes. “If I’m bewitched, I don’t care, so long as you love me back—that’s what matters, isn’t it? I love you, I do, the same as he does. And I don’t care why—”

  It hurt. God, it hurt.

  He said, then, faintly, “Damn him.” He shut his eyes, and she wished, aching, Don’t do that to him, Kavi. Please. It’s not fair.

  Yvgenie sank down where he was, head on his arms, not looking at her. There was pain, that was all she could hear, pain and fear and not wanting her to die because of him, when he was already sure he would die, and follow her, and do anything he had to to stay with her until someone put an end to him—because he would not leave her—not so long as he existed—

  Nor touch her again, so long as he could help it, no matter what he killed—

  “Please,” he said without looking at her. “Please just leave me alone.”

  She wanted—but wanting stopped short of hurting him again. She went back to her book and sat down and wrote.

  I wanted someone like my father. I didn’t know what I was wanting. I don’t know what my father is with my mother, what Kavi is and what she was. Now I know what it feels like. Now I know and I can’t do anything. There’s nothing I can wish that doesn’t hurt and there’s nowhere for me to go but with Yvgenie, because—

  A leaf fell onto the paper. Other leaves were falling, some on the ground, a few into the fire, where they flared and burned and perished.

  11

  A ring of salt, her father had said, and Nadya had done that as quickly as possible, around her, around Sasha, around the spotted horse, too. But she had not been thinking about firewood when she had been drawing the circle, and the fire was getting desperately low. She added leaves. She stood up and broke off overhanging twigs, and a branch and broke it up and saved it back as long as she could.

  But the fire began to die. And the spotted horse made a soft, anxious sound. That made her think that she might have been fatally foolish, that with the fire grown so small, whatever was out there dared come closer and closer, and if the light did not even reach the bushes she would have to go out I here totally in the dark.

  She had to do it. She took the knife from her boot and went out of the circle, breaking branches with cracks that sounded frighteningly loud in the hush about her.

  Something hissed at her, right at her feet. She jumped, clenching her knife, and all but fell over her own skirts, seeing two round gold eyes looking at her.

  It was the Yard-thing. Babi. Bab
i stared at her and growled and she very carefully backed away, taking her armful of wood and her knife back into the circle.

  Babi turned up there, too. Pop. Babi crouched down his head on his paws and showed white, white teeth while she fed sticks into the fire and wished, please the god, that Sasha would wake up soon, and not be angry with her about being left—and that the Yard-thing would not decide she was a threat and bite her hand off.

  Please.

  Babi barked at her. And vanished. She sat there with her knife in her hand and her arms around her knees and waited, shivering despite the fire.

  Sasha would not be angry with her. Sasha would not be angry with her. She had waited all her life for some ill-wish that would make her slip on the stairs or catch a fish-bone in her throat or even just take a fever—the silly knife was only because nobody took her seriously, the guards never took her orders, the guards and the servants would never listen to her if she was in danger, and at least if she had the knife she had something, if only against whoever might break into the house the way Pyetr Kochevikov had done.

  Except he had not broken in, she believed that part. She believed everything else. Her uncles had snatched up the silver and the gold and her mother had gathered up her jewels and her best clothes and when she had come to say goodbye—because Yvgenie had said he would take her where people would forget who they were—her mother had said go where she liked. Go where she liked—and no truth even then.

  She wiped her face with the heel of her hand, angry, dammit, for that, for all the years of lies, all the years of modest, lying virtue that had made her afraid of this and afraid of that, most of all afraid of—

  Sasha’s eyes had opened. He was looking at her. He went on looking at her and the breath froze in her throat.

  Anything he wants, her father had said.

  He moved his elbow, and pushed himself up to look around. “God. Pyetr?” He staggered to his feet to look about firelit woods, and at her, with an accusation that made breathing difficult.

  He remembered her father riding off into the dark, she remembered him telling her, Take care of Sasha… Tell him—you don’t have to tell him. He knows things like that. Just take care of him. He doesn’t remember to do that himself…

  “Oh, god,” Sasha said, and she got up, she had no idea why, except he was in a hurry, and she could think of nothing but gathering things up and getting on the horse, whose name was Missy, and finding Pyetr before something found him, please the god—

  Sasha was packing up his books. He said, “How long has he been gone?” and she answered, “A while,” shivering inside, because she realized then he was making her think of things, and he was sorry. He wanted her to forgive him and she did, she had no choice. Dammit!

  “Please.” He cast her a look of purest misery. “I think I wished you here, I could have wished you born and Pyetr to trouble for all I know, and please excuse me, I’m not used to being near ordinary people, except Pyetr.”

  Her father knew how to listen to him and answer him with just thinking, her father was a brave man with no fear of him, or of half the things else in the world he should be afraid of. Like vodyaniye. Like wizards and his other daughter and the rusalka who had taken Yvgenie…

  “Please,” he said faintly, aloud, and she saw herself standing there with a knife in her hand, while he was standing there with his hands full of ropes and packs, and wanting her not to stand in his horse’s way, please, so Missy could reach him, so they could be moving. Something might have wanted Pyetr to go alone. Pyetr had had that notion from the beginning. And Pyetr had so little defense against the people he loved. Please be out of the way—and do what he asked— right now. Please.

  Day came creeping through the tangle of branches, with the distant muttering of thunder—decidedly not the sound a man wanted to hear, with wizards involved. Pyetr dipped his hands in cold water, splashed his face and wiped his hair back for the moment it would stay out of his eyes, rocked onto his knees and sat with his eyes shut a moment, while Volkhi drank.

  Not the wisest thing to do, perhaps, going off the second time alone, but in coldest sanity he did not think that surprising the mouse or ‘Veshka with Nadya in his company was the best idea right now. Jealousy, hurt feelings, he had seen enough, even between his wife and the daughter he had known all her life.

  And if an unmagical man had gotten any wisdom about magic after all these years, or about the hearts of wizards, there seemed only one way to put a stop to craziness when wishes got out of hand, and that was to put himself squarely in their way.

  Sasha, Eveshka, Ilyana. Do what you like. But I’m not on anyone’s side. I won’t be. Don’t think it.

  A second splash of water. The air was cold. But he and the old lad had been moving, and he had hurt his hand somewhere, add that to the account of an aching shoulder and aching bones. Nothing against nature, Sasha would say.

  But, god, what else have we done in this woods?

  Third splash of water. He shut his eyes and let the water run down his neck, numbing the fire in his shoulders and the ache behind his eyes. There was no constant pull and push here, no knowledge turning up unasked—it was quiet, truly quiet, except the wind in the leaves.

  At this distance from aggrieved parties the man in the middle could draw a few sane breaths and try to think how many sides there were to this affair—

  No one’s side. Not even excluding Chernevog’s. Or the boy’s. Or my other daughter’s. None of you and all of you are my side. And I’m all alone out here—any wish that’s ever let loose about me has its chance. Even Chernevog’s. Mouse, you chose him. If you want him and you want me, and he wants that boy—magic’s got the best chance at me it’s had yet.

  I do hope you love your father—because he’s going to put himself where he needs help, mouse, he’s going to do it until you notice.

  If you want things to be right, mouse, and you want your own way, you’d better want the right things. Can you possibly hear me?

  No? Then I’d better be moving. Fast as I can, mouse. I was right in the first place. Maybe Sasha can’t catch up with me this time. Maybe it’ll be up to you. What do you think of that, mouse?

  I do hope you think about that.

  It was less and less effort to hold the silence: it seemed to be holding itself, now, and it had a lonelier and lonelier feeling since last night. They had waked this morning under a blanket of new-fallen leaves, and berry bushes, young trees and streamsides of bracken and silver birch gave way to shaded solitude, aged beeches and oaks far rougher and stouter than the trees to the south—perhaps, Ilyana thought, they had come to the end of the woods that they knew—at least, despite Yvgenie’s warnings, they had gotten, if not further than others’ wishes had ever been—at least well away from any place wizards who knew her had ever been. Perhaps that was the silence. But one hated to break a branch here. One felt fear—whether that it was something in the forest itself or whether it was only the unaccustomed stillness.

  But when she wanted Patches to go a little more carefully Bielitsa brushed past her, finding a way through the thicket that her magic had not found. It was surely Kavi guiding them again, she thought, and set Patches to follow the gently winding course.

  “Not a friendly place,” she said when he stopped and gave her the chance to overtake him. She had pricked her finger moving a branch aside, and sucked at it. “Can you feel it?”

  “It was never friendly. I knew we were close last night. I didn’t know how close. We might have reached it… But something’s wrong.”

  Absolutely it was Kavi now. He slid down from Bielitsa’s back, bade her follow and led the way afoot, a long, difficult passage in among aged, peeling trees. Not a wholesome place, she thought to herself: the further they went the more desolate the place seemed, until at last nothing near them was alive. Thorn-bushes broke with dry crackling, the moss went to powder underfoot, trees stood ghostly pale, bare-trunked.

  “Kavi,” she said, “Kavi, stop. Th
ere’s nothing good here.”

  He looked back at her, so pale, so frighteningly pale and afraid.

  “There’s nothing alive here,” he said distressedly. “It’s dead.”

  She thought, Is this what he meant, that it was wrong to wish a place where wishes weren’t? Is this that place?

  It’s as if wishes fail here, as if you can pour them into this place, and nothing gets out—

  But Kavi was leaving her, going deeper into this place. She was sure it was Kavi now, sure it was Kavi who ignored her pleas and kept going—

  It was surely Kavi who led Bielitsa into a ring of dead trees, to a stone slab that might have been nature’s work—or not. She pushed her way past a fragile thorn-branch and led Patches through, as Owl came close and lit on the ground before the stone—the same place, god, her father and the sword: it was that stone, it was the place where Owl had died.

  And standing all about them, huge trunks, peeling bark, white wood, like trees but not. Nor standing as trees would grow, wind-trained and orderly. There was disarray here. There was randomness.

  “They’re dead,” he said, faintly, distressedly, “they’re all dead, Ilyana.”

  She looked about them, seeing in the peeling trunks the likeness of empty eyes and the whiteness of bone. She wanted Babi with her, please. She wanted anything alive, besides herself and Yvgenie and the horses, because nothing else here was. She wanted anything magical and wholesome— because magic had gone from this place, magic had died here—not well, or peacefully.

  Kavi sank down on the stone as if the strength had gone out of him, too—and she felt alarm, thinking: A rusalka’s magical, isn’t he? as Owl flew up to perch by him on the stone. He took Owl on his hand and said, faintly, “They wanted me to bring you here. But it’s too late now.”

  “Bring me here? Why? Misighi’s my uncle’s friend. Misighi could come to the house—they don’t need anyone to bring me to them. If they wanted me to come here, they could just have asked, couldn’t they?”